Andrew Johnson's impeachment trial begins, March 13, 1868

On this day in 1868, the Senate put Andrew Johnson, who had become the nation’s 17th president after Abraham Lincoln’s assassination, on trial following his impeachment by the House.

With Salmon Chase, the chief justice, presiding, Johnson’s defense panel requested 40 days to collect evidence and witnesses, but initially only 10 days were granted. The trial resumed on March 30 after further procedural wrangling. Rep. Benjamin Butler (R-Mass.) opened the case for the prosecution with a three-hour speech in which he talked about impeachment trials going back to King John of England, who died in 1216.

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At the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861, Johnson was the only senator from a seceding state who remained loyal to the Union. In his political career in Tennessee, he had championed the interests of poor white Southerners against the landed gentry. In opposing secession, he said, “Damn the negroes. I am fighting those traitorous aristocrats, their masters.” To reward his loyalty, Lincoln named him military governor of Tennessee in 1862 and chose him as his running mate in 1864.

As president, Johnson pursued lenient policies toward the vanquished South, including virtually total amnesty for former Confederates.

In 1867, over Johnson’s veto, radical Republicans enacted the Tenure of Office Act, which barred the president from removing federal officeholders who had been confirmed by the Senate without senatorial consent. Defying the radicals, Johnson fired their hard-line ally, Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, precipitating the impeachment crisis.

On May 16, the Senate by the narrowest of margins failed to convict Johnson. On three successive occasions, 35 senators voted “guilty” and 19 “not guilty.” Since the Constitution requires a two-thirds majority for conviction, Johnson escaped from being ousted from office by one vote.

The U.S. Supreme Court subsequently held the Tenure of Office Act to be unconstitutional.

SOURCE: “IMPEACHMENT OF A PRESIDENT: ANDREW JOHNSON, THE BLACKS, AND RECONSTRUCTION,” BY HANS TREFOUSSE (1999)